Bashir Assad Quotes

Military hardliners called me a 'security threat' for promoting peace in South Asia and for supporting a broad-based government in Afghanistan.

We need a Peace Department in our national government to do extensive research on peaceful ways of resolving conflicts. Then we can ask other countries to create similar departments.

Peace on this planet will not be forged by military strength. It will be forged by those who come together despite their government's differences.

The fact is that co-operation between independent countries - to our mutual advantage - is the way of the modern world.

I believe that our national security lies not just in protecting our borders, but in bridging divides.

It's really necessary for the United States to continue to give strong leadership to the Middle East peace process, supported by European countries at the same time.

I see the war problem as an economic problem, a business problem, a cultural problem, an educational problem - everything but a military problem. There's no military solution. There is a business solution - and the sooner we can provide jobs, not with our money, but the United States has to provide the framework.

The U.N.'s impartiality allows it to negotiate and operate in some of the toughest places in the world. And time and again, studies have shown that U.N. peacekeeping is far more effective and done with far less money than what any government can do on its own.

We won the war, but we are losing the occupation and reconstruction of Iraq. It is past time for a new approach, one that relies on accountability, responsibility, and phasing down the scope of our military commitment.

Genuine peace must be the product of many nations, the sum of many acts. It must be dynamic, not static, changing to meet the challenge of each new generation.

As a member and chairman of the House Intelligence Committee during the 2000s, I met with civilian and military officials in Kurdistan, Libya, Jordan, Israel, Egypt, and Yemen. They shared many of the same international defense priorities as the United States. We acknowledged our differences, but we worked from where we found common ground.

I call on Russia and the United States of America, the cosponsors of the peace conference, to help the peace process take bigger steps by contributing to the process and helping to overcome all obstacles.

'Smart power' is the use of American power in ways that would help prevent and resolve conflict - not just send our military in.

I am certain that a solution of the general problem of peace must rest on broad and basic understanding on the part of its peoples. Great single endeavors like a League of Nations, a United Nations, and undertakings of that character, are of great importance and in fact absolutely necessary, but they must be treated as steps toward the desired end.

I'm so thankful a significant majority of Americans are saying no to military intervention. We've got to find a solution that will in the end be one that makes Syria a better country, a better people.

No achievement can be higher than that of working in harmony with other nations so that the lash of war may be lifted from our backs and a peace of lasting friendship descend upon us.

My hope was that by saying clearly to Saddam Hussein, "we're going to enforce UN Resolutions," that he would make the decision to leave peaceably and at least allow for inspectors to come into his country, and if he chose not to, there would be a military option. I want people to understand that the military was my last option. I had a strategy and hopefully solving the problem peacefully - and it wasn't just me, it was a coalition of nations that were involved.

Our country is now at war and the only way out is forward. I would not change one word I have spoken against war but that is no longer the issue. We must now stand together.

If you are waging peace, you can't be too particular sometimes about the special attitudes that different countries take. We were a young country once, and our whole policy for the first 150 years was, we were neutral.

Some people who hated Americans set out to kill a lot of us and they succeeded [on 9/11]....We're trying to protect ourselves with more weapons. We have to do it, I guess, but it might be better if we figured out how to behave as a nation in a way that wouldn't make so many people in the world want to kill us.

There is no question in my mind that if we summon our resources, both our leadership resources and all of the tools at our disposal, not just military force, which should be used as a last resort, but our diplomacy, our development aid, law enforcement, sharing of intelligence in a much more open and cooperative way. We can bring people together, but it cannot be an American fight.

We are ready to cooperate in any way to achieve stability in Syria, of course taking into consideration the interest of the country, and the will of the Syrian people.

I assured the prime minister, my administration will work hard to lay the foundation of peace in the Middle - to work with our nations in the Middle East, give peace a chance. Secondly, I told him that our nation will not try to force peace, that we'll facilitate peace and that we will work with those responsible for a peace.

Peace is a never-ending process, the work of many decisions by many people in many countries. It is an attitude, a way of life, a way of solving problems and resolving conflicts. It cannot be forced on the smallest nation or enforced by the largest. It cannot ignore our differences or overlook our common interests. It requires us to work and live together.

The 'realist' conception of continuing old-fashioned 'balance of power' politics may have been well founded in the past, but it is inconsistent with our increasing interdependent world. On moral grounds alone there can be no justification for the 20th century level of killing. To settle disputes without violence must become the primary goal of foreign policy for every nation.